The honourable gentleman sees that I respect the principle upon
which he goes, as well as his intentions and his abilities. He will
believe that I do not differ from him wantonly, and on trivial
grounds. He is very sure that it was not his embracing one way
which determined me to take the other. I have not, in newspapers,
to derogate from his fair fame with the nation, printed the first
rude sketch of his bill with ungenerous and invidious comments. I
have not, in conversations industriously circulated about the town,
and talked on the benches of this House, attributed his conduct to
motives low and unworthy, and as groundless as they are injurious.
I do not affect to be frightened with this proposition, as if some
hideous spectre had started from hell, which was to be sent back
again by every form of exorcism, and every kind of incantation. I
invoke no Acheron to overwhelm him in the whirlpools of his muddy
gulf. I do not tell the respectable mover and seconder, by a
perversion of their sense and expressions, that their proposition
halts between the ridiculous and the dangerous. I am not one of
those who start up three at a time, and fall upon and strike at him
with so much eagerness, that our daggers hack one another in his
sides.
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